Americans Warm, Teen Soviet Visitor Says

August 05, 1989|By CHARLES CLARY Staff Writer

JAMES CITY (COUNTY) — One of the things that Natal'ia Luk'iantseva, a teen-ager from the Soviet Union, marvels over in her first trip to the United States is the number of times people say hello to greet the same person during the day.

"We say hello only in the morning when we say it for the first time," Luk'iantseva said Friday. "Here we say it 20 times a day. We say `Hi, how are you doing?'"

From the frequent greetings she concluded "Americans are warm people."

Luk'iantseva and Natal'ia Tyrina are just two of 14 Soviet students who participated in a 30-day program sponsored by the American Council of Teachers of Russian, based in Washington, D.C. The program included a 19-day course with American students in Russian and American studies at the Governor's Academy for Russian Studies conducted at James Madison University in Harrisonsburg.

Now Luk'iantseva and Tyrina, both 16, are spending a week on the Peninsula with friends they made during the program as part of the Soviet-American Youth Exchange.

Luk'iantseva's hosts are George and Susan Constantinides of Yorktown. Tyrina is visiting the home of William and Joan Wieme in James City. Wieme's daughter, Kelly, is a Lafayette High School student, and Constantinides' daughter, Alexa, attends York High School.

Luk'iantseva and Tyrina, at the Wiemes' home Friday, said the exchange probably would not have occurred 10 years ago when there was no such thing as glasnost, Russian for openness. Such things as their visit and the exchange of visits by Soviet and U.S. sailors are encouraging "because there must be more exchange between the largest countries in the world," Luk'iantseva said.

"Glasnost is a great step forward in our country," Luk'iantseva said. "Many years ago we didn't have the freedom to speak. Now we can speak about anything we want."

Tyrina and Luk'iantseva, both of whom speak English well, were exposed to American culture in their studies beginning at age 8. Luk'iantseva recalled some impressions she received from a description of the United States given by an instructor from Alaska.

"He told us about sports, about stress in America and the cities," she said. On one occasion, "he wore a costume for Halloween. He walked around the street in this costume. It was very strange for us."

Forty-five Virginia students participated in the rigorous program, which is designed to expose American students to the Russian culture and language, said Betsy Sandston, associate director. During the 19-day program, students spent 14 hours a day in language, culture, geography, athletic activities and literature classes, Sandston said.

This is the third year of the program, but the first year that Russian students participated. It seemed a natural way to broaden the students' exploration of each others language to encourage the students to visit American homes for a week, Sandston said.